Ok, so this has been hashed out again and again, especially since the Olympics, and we've already discovered that the gap between US and the international scene in terms of basketball really isn't that big. The number international players is greater, and honestly, the talent is there. We still dominated the Olympics though, not because I think that the talent isn't there but it's spread out, US still has the highest concentration of raw talent, if we were to look at, however, best of US vs the best of international NBA players, I think the story would be quite different. I don't know, here's my take (assuming this is like an NBA basketball exhibition game, all players healthy and all that stupid "reitired from international" stuff aside, also, we'll say that Tim Duncan doesn't have a problem because he's not playing the Virgin Islands)
The US NBA Players:
PG- Chris Paul, Deron Williams
SG- Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade, Joe Johnson
SF- LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony
PF- Amare Stoudemire, Kevin Garnett, Chris Bosh
C- Dwight Howard, Tim Duncan
Res: Paul Pierce, Tracy McGrady
The International NBA Players:
PG- Tony Parker, Steve Nash, Jose Calderon
SG- Manu Ginobili, Leandro Barbosa
SF- Luol Deng, Hedo Turkoglu
PF- Pau Gasol, Dirk Nowitzki, Nene Hilario
C- Yao Ming, Andris Biedrins
Res: Rudy Fernandez, Samuel Dalembert
I'm not sure, the USA players might have more marquee names, but I don't think the score differnential will be as big as some might expect. I think it'd be a really close game, something of a tossup. What do you think?
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